Improved strength four covering arrays with three symbols (Q1706436)

A covering array \(t\)-CA\((n,k,g)\) is a \(k \times n\) array on \(g\) symbols such that every \(t \times n\) sub-array contains every \(t \times 1\) column on \(g\) symbols at least once. The covering array number \(t\)-CAN\((k,g)\) is the smallest \(n\) for which a \(t\)-CA\((n,k,g)\) exists. Many new upper bounds on \(4\)-CAN\((k,3)\) are here obtained. The record-breaking covering arrays have a large prescribed automorphism group. In particular, projective general linear groups are utilized. Various techniques are further used in attempts to improve the covering arrays found. The authors also study arrays with all parameters \(t\), \(n\), \(k\), and \(g\) fixed. Such structures are in this context called covering arrays with budget constraints. The aim is then to maximize the coverage, which is defined as the number of \(t\)-tuples contained in the column vectors of the array divided by the total number of \(t\)-tuples, which is \(\binom{k}{t}g^t\).